Ornamental Patterns – Paja Galleria (FI)
Ornamental Patterns
Solo Exhibition
14.08–18.09.2026
Paja Galleria, Helsinki, Finland
The exhibition Ornamental Patterns is an exploration of written communication through letterpress printing, and its link to pattern making. The exhibition brings together multiple bodies of work, formed while investigating the visual qualities of text, print, abstraction and repetition.
The exhibition features three editions of the letterpress publication Ornamental Patterns: printed consecutively at S/O Helsinki (FI, 2023), TYPA Printing and Paper Art Centre (EE, 2023) and London Centre for Book Arts (UK, 2026). The publication consists of patterns made through the use of printer's ornaments: the decorative elements found amongst metal type drawers in letterpress studios. Unlike typographic forms, printer’s ornaments were created for decorative rather than communication-based purposes. Yet these metal ornaments are equally descriptive of the era and place they were made in, and the studios they now belong to. The publications therefore resemble abstracted type specimen books – often used by letterpress printers as well as contemporary type designers. Alongside the publication, multiple hand drawn patterns – also based on the ornaments – are displayed, expanding on letterpress as a printed medium, to a drawn one.
All photographs by Juuso Noronkoski.
Solo Exhibition
14.08–18.09.2026
Paja Galleria, Helsinki, Finland
The exhibition Ornamental Patterns is an exploration of written communication through letterpress printing, and its link to pattern making. The exhibition brings together multiple bodies of work, formed while investigating the visual qualities of text, print, abstraction and repetition.
The exhibition features three editions of the letterpress publication Ornamental Patterns: printed consecutively at S/O Helsinki (FI, 2023), TYPA Printing and Paper Art Centre (EE, 2023) and London Centre for Book Arts (UK, 2026). The publication consists of patterns made through the use of printer's ornaments: the decorative elements found amongst metal type drawers in letterpress studios. Unlike typographic forms, printer’s ornaments were created for decorative rather than communication-based purposes. Yet these metal ornaments are equally descriptive of the era and place they were made in, and the studios they now belong to. The publications therefore resemble abstracted type specimen books – often used by letterpress printers as well as contemporary type designers. Alongside the publication, multiple hand drawn patterns – also based on the ornaments – are displayed, expanding on letterpress as a printed medium, to a drawn one.
All photographs by Juuso Noronkoski.